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The Enduring Legacy of John Paul II’s 1982 Visit to Britain

“For the first time in history,” said Pope St. John Paul II after he stepped off the airplane, “a Bishop of Rome sets foot on English soil.”

Joanna Bogle, February 16, 2022 – National Catholic Register

In 2022, the Church in Britain marks an important milestone in its long history: This May, it will be 40 years since the first visit of a pope to Britain.

And it almost didn’t happen.

There had been months of preparation, much debate and discussion in the media, elaborate rehearsals by choirs and cathedrals and Catholic organizations, the hiring of massive venues, including London’s famous Wembley Stadium — and then the Falklands war broke out, and the whole idea of a papal visit was called into question.

Most people in Britain knew little or nothing about the Falkland Islands, a small British colony in the South Atlantic. In April 1982, Argentinian forces invaded the Falklands, swept the small British garrison aside, and announced that the islands were now in Argentinian control.  Britain responded by sending a Royal Navy task force, and effectively the British were at war.

As part of the anniversary, I have been dipping into archives and discovering the inside story of the emergency meetings and messages that went back and forth between Britain and Rome as the crisis deepened and the papal visit was at risk of being abandoned. There must have been a great deal of prayer. Pope John Paul II, of course, led the prayers for peace, and British and Argentinian bishops were summoned to Rome, where he celebrated a Mass with them all. And then came the climax of the last-minute rescue operation to save the situation: He flew to Argentina for a swiftly arranged papal visit, before going on to Britain.

It was clear throughout that the Pope was not only neutral but that he was vigorously promoting peace: This was his consistent message, and it never wavered. On this basis, he was able to fly to London’s Gatwick Airport, where, as planned in detail over the previous months, a large crowd, drawn from Catholic parishes across Surrey and Sussex, had gathered to greet him. I was among that crowd. I remember the early-morning start and the excitement as we all arrived in a chartered bus, and then the wait at the airport, where the Duke of Norfolk — by long-established tradition Britain’s senior Catholic layman — greeted the Pope at the airport steps.

This was not, it was emphasized, an official visit. This was a pastoral visit of the Pope to Britain’s Catholics. So no formal representative of the queen was at the airport, and there were no government officials. There was music, and we sang a welcoming hymn. Then there were speeches — and the history was made. The Pope summed it up when he proclaimed, “For the first time in history, a Bishop of Rome sets foot on English soil.”

In its own way, the tragedy of the Falklands War — more than 800 men, British and Argentinian, would eventually lose their lives in the fighting — helped to create a situation where old antagonisms dating back to the Reformation in Britain seemed to dwindle away. The papal visit became a true opportunity for a message of peace and goodwill, with anti-Catholicism of the old sort somehow at variance with a general recognition of the needs of the modern era. The whole visit had, in any case, been planned with ecumenical goodwill in mind, and there were some powerful moments, notably at Canterbury Cathedral, where the Pope prayed with Anglicans at the site of the martyrdom of St. Thomas Becket.

And, yes, he did meet the queen — a courtesy visit, with tea at Buckingham Palace — with evident goodwill on both sides. Queen Elizabeth was wearing, I remember, a blue dress, and they were smiling and chatting as they emerged from the palace after tea. Postcards of the scene quickly became popular — I’ve still got mine.

The papal pilgrimage had the seven sacraments as its theme. At a packed Mass at Westminster Cathedral, the Pope baptized seven candidates of various ages, and then, after crossing the Thames at Lambeth Bridge, he arrived at St. George’s Cathedral, Southwark, which had been cleared of pews and filled with stretchers and wheelchairs bearing sick and disabled people from across Britain, and he administered the sacrament of the sick. And so it went on, across England and Wales and Scotland, with a penitential service, first Holy Communions, confirmations, ordinations and renewal of marriage vows. Vast crowds came, powerful moments of prayer experienced.

It was an unforgettable time. Looking back through the archives, something of the joy and excitement is still evident. So, too, are the changes since those days — the letters are typewritten (remember typewriters?) and there is just one reference to “a computer being installed” as a great innovation at one venue to store relevant information. Color photography relied entirely on film, paper and chemicals (some of the pictures have that curious greenish tinge that I remember well).  Fashions have, of course, changed: Ladies wore dresses, and there were even quite a lot of hats.

What did the papal visit achieve? A great deal. With its massive television coverage, it opened up an authentic vision of Catholic worship: from how Catholics pray to the centrality of the Eucharist. People saw what a baptism is and what is meant by the anointing of the sick. They saw the Pope as a bishop, a man in a white robe preaching about peace and the importance of family life and family prayer. Old notions of the Pope as a sinister foreign figure intent on imposing some sort of political rule were recognized as propaganda from a vanished era.

And that 1982 visit was followed, in the next century, by an official state visit by Pope Benedict XVI, where among much else, he addressed Parliament with a magnificent setting out of the respective roles of Church and state centered on a ringing call for true religious freedom. He led young people in a massive unforgettable night vigil of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in London’s Hyde Park, and he beatified John Henry Newman in a glorious Mass at Cofton Park on the outskirts of Birmingham.

The year 2022 sees another major milestone in Britain’s story: the platinum jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. She has always been clear in her commitment to the Christian faith and spoken of it as central to her life and service.

So much has changed in the 70 years of her reign. While there has been progress in fields that include health and general prosperity, there is also much that is cause for great sadness: Britain is a country with too much violent crime, many unhappy young people, a drug crisis, a worrying suicide rate, and a collapse in a general understanding of many basic moral values, including the value of human life itself.

But the Christian message is still on offer and is the message that holds the hope of renewal; and in a country with a long history, and a tradition of marking anniversaries and jubilees, 2022 brings scope for missionary activity on a new scale. We must pray the opportunity is taken up. A reminder of that historic papal visit four decades ago is part of that.

John Paul’s 1982 visit to Britain an "extraordinary event"

By Vatican News

“Saint John Paul II’s visit [to Britain in 1982] was an extraordinary event in the life of the Catholic Church in the UK,” writes Sally Axworthy, the British Ambassador to the Holy See.

Axworthy notes that it was the first time a reigning pontiff had ever set foot on British soil, and that the visit “marked a historic moment in UK-Holy See relations”.

The Holy Father visited nine cities in England, Wales and Scotland over the course of six days. In addition to his meeting with Queen Elizabeth at Buckingham Palace, highlights of the visit included addresses to young people in Cardiff and Edinburgh, and an open-air Mass in Glasgow that drew more than 300,000 participants.

“Ecumenism was central to his visit,” Axworthy says, noting John Paul’s visit to Canterbury Cathedral, where he met with the Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie.

“By attending the cathedral founded by St Augustine of Canterbury on his mission to England from Pope Gregory the Great in the sixth century, St John Paul II made a powerful statement of the churches' determination to walk forward together,” she writes. “This ecumenical dialogue has flourished ever since.”

John Paul’s 1982 visit to Britain paved the way for future “great moments” in the life of the Church in the UK, including Pope Benedict XVI’s visit in 2010 and the canonisation of St John Henry Newman in 2019. The “legacy” of that visit, says Axworthy, “was the strengthening and deepening of the relationship between the UK and the Holy See that is bearing fruit today”.

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Britain forty years after St. John Paul II’s historic visit

Reflecting on the 1982 papal visit forty years later, I see much change — some good, but a great deal that is very bad — in Britain since that time.

January 15, 2022 Joanna Bogle The Dispatch 1 Print

This year will see the 40 th anniversary of the first ever visit of a pope to England, Scotland, and Wales. Given the complicated history of the Catholic Church in Britain, it is truly remarkable that the anniversary somehow doesn’t seem remarkable at all. The May 28-June 2, 1982 joyful visit of Pope – now Saint – John Paul II was followed by another papal visit, this time at the express invitation of HM the Queen, and Pope Benedict XVI arrived in September 2010 to be greeted by the Sovereign at her palace in Scotland and address a great gathering at the Houses of Parliament in Westminster.

History rolls on, and in this anniversary year we can note how the papal visits have been embedded into our national story and how ordinary it all seems. Stone slabs at Westminster Cathedral – one at the foot of the sanctuary, another at the main door – commemorate the two visits. The vision of religious freedom affirmed by Pope Benedict in his magnificent address at Westminster is recognized as one that brilliantly articulates the authentic teaching of the Church and affirms the truth recognized by all who seek genuine goodwill.

St John Paul’s visit could have been so easily derailed. Britain was at war. The Falklands crisis had erupted and the Royal Navy made its way to the South Atlantic to confront Argentinian claims. Some magnificent diplomacy on all sides achieved something that might have seemed impossible: the Pope made a last-minute visit to Argentina before traveling to London, so that Catholics in both countries could hear a genuine message of peace from the successor of St Peter. The visit to Britain thus had a pastoral quality, with nothing triumphalistic about it: it was not a time for scoring points.

When I look back at my younger self, cheering among the crowd at Gatwick Airport as the papal plane landed and watching on television as the Pope went to Buckingham Palace for tea, I am amazed at how little I realized about the significance of it all. Some of us at that time simply saw the pope as someone who should say things we wanted to hear – about the wrongfulness of abortion, for example – within a sort of zone of this-is-what-popes-should-do. We didn’t see things with the eye of history; perhaps that’s simply something that is acquired with age.

We liked being indignant about things, and so were on the lookout for anything we thought was too trendy or “wishy-washy” – though when I was urged to share indignation about Pope John Paul II being open and friendly with the Anglicans at Canterbury I found that on the contrary it all looked rather valuable. Now, four decades on and with the creation of the Ordinariate by Benedict XVI it all looks prophetic: Anglicans can now come into full communion with the Catholic Church, bringing their liturgical and other traditions with them. Upon arriving at Gatwick Airport, John Paul II sounded a central theme of his visit: reconciliation:

At this moment of history, we stand in  urgent need of reconciliation : reconciliation between nations and between peoples of different races and cultures; reconciliation of man within himself and with nature; reconciliation among people of different social conditions and beliefs, reconciliation among Christians. In a world scarred by hatred and injustice and divided by violence and oppression, the Church desires to be a spokesman for the vital task of fostering harmony and unity and forging new bonds of understanding and brotherhood.

St John Paul had been Pope for just four years at the time of that history-making visit. He had already survived two assassination attempts, one in St Peter’s Square on May 13, 1981, and another a year later on May 12, 1982, at Fatima where he went to give thanks and was attacked by a schismatic priest. He was already becoming the world’s voice of conscience, and over the next years his magnificent encyclicals and other writings (and many addresses) would ring out the truth about the glory of God and the dignity of man.

And those years were often thrilling. John Paul II had yet to achieve the quite extraordinary invention of World Youth Day. In 1982 great gatherings of that sort were still seen as reserved for political rallies or popular music festivals, but he would bring about the astonishing sight of vast crowds of young people from across the world kneeling in silent prayer before the Blessed Sacrament or lining up before relays of confessors to receive absolution. He would bring about dramatic change in Eastern Europe. In 1982 that was already on the way, as his 1979 pilgrimage to his native Poland had set in train the events that would lead to the formation of Solidarity, and eventual freedom from the Communism that had been imposed since 1945.

Reflecting on the 1982 papal visit forty years later, I see the many changes in Britain since that time. There is a great deal that is very bad: continued destruction of babies in their mothers’ wombs, plus massive publicly-funded promotion of bizarre notions of confused sexual identity, and a general withering of standards of excellence in academia. And there is a new surge of constant sniping at cherished values and symbols of historical achievement, and of course an increase of misery as marriages and families collapse under all sorts of pressures.

Is there anything good to note? Not much: the Ordinariate, as mentioned, some new evangelistic initiatives (back in 1982 no one could have imagined a great National Eucharistic Congress on the scale that we had in 2018), and the fact that Christianity here isn’t dead, as I remember being repeatedly told, when younger, would be the case by the 21 st century.

“The most annoying thing about you, Joanna,” someone expostulated recently, “is that, especially about the Church, you are always wanting to see the good things.” I think, looking back, it is because, while I was still comparatively young, I encountered the message of St John Paul II.

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• Pope St. John Paul II

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How Latvia’s Christian churches use JPII’s natural law teaching to defend life and family

Warsaw, Poland, Jun 9, 2022 / 09:17 am (CNA).

Constant cooperation and dialogue among Catholic, Lutherans, Orthodox, and other Christian denominations have been crucial to protect life and family in the Baltic nation of Latvia, Archbishop Zbigņevs Stankevičs of Riga, Latvia, said during a recent Catholic conference in Warsaw.

Stankevičs spoke May 19 at the conference “ St. John Paul II Natural Law Legacy ,” organized by the  Ave Maria School of Law  and the Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University in Warsaw.

In his speech, Stankevičs shared his personal ecumenical experience in Latvia as an example of how the concept of natural law proposed by St. John Paul II can serve as the basis for ecumenical cooperation in defending human values.

The metropolitan archbishop, based in Latvia’s capital, is no stranger to ecumenical work and thought. In 2001, he became the first bishop consecrated in a Lutheran church since the split from Protestantism in the 1500s. The unusual move, which occurred in the church of Evangelical Lutheran Cathedral in Riga, formerly the Catholic Cathedral of St. Mary, signaled the beginning of Stankevičs’ cooperation with the Lutheran church in Latvia, a cooperation that would ultimately become a partnership in the cause of life and the family. Since 2012, the archbishop has served on the  Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity . 

“I would like to present this ecumenical cooperation in three experiences in my country: the abortion debate, the civil unions discussion, and the so-called Istanbul convention,” Stankevičs began. 

Entering the abortion debate

Ordained as a priest in 1996, Stankevičs struggled to find proper consultation for Catholic couples on natural family planning. It was then that he decided to create a small center that provided natural family planning under the motto “let us protect the miracle [of fertility].”

This involvement in the world of natural family planning would lead him into the heart of the abortion debate in Latvian society, and, ultimately, to the conclusion that moral discussions in the public square benefit from a basis in natural law, something emphasized in the teachings of John Paul II. 

“I knew that theological arguments would not work for a secular audience, so I wanted to show that Catholic arguments are not opposed to legal, scientific, and universal arguments, but rather are in harmony with them,” Stankevičs said. 

“[A] few years later our parliament introduced the discussion to legalize abortion. No one was doing anything so I decided to do something. I consulted some experts and presented a proposal that was published in the most important secular newspaper in Latvia,” the archbishop said.

Stankevičs’ article, “Why I was Lucky,” used both biological and theological arguments to defend human life. He noted that his own mother, when pregnant with him, was under pressure to get an abortion; “but she was a believer, a Catholic, so she refused the pressure.” 

After the Latvian parliament legalized abortion in 2002, the different Christian confessions decided to start working together to protect the right to life and the family.  

In Latvia, Catholics comprise 25% of the population, Lutherans 34.2%, and Russian Orthodox 17%, with other smaller, mostly Christian denominations making up the remainder.

“We started to work together by the initiative of a businessman in Riga, a non-believer who wanted to promote awareness about the humanity of the unborn,” the archbishop recalled.

“Bringing all Christians together in a truly ecumenical effort ended up bearing good fruits because we worked together in promoting a culture of life: From more than 7,000 abortions per year in 2002, we were able to bring it down to 2,000 by 2020,” he said. 

Ecumenical defense of marriage, family

Regarding the legislation on civil unions, another area where Stankevičs has rallied ecumenical groups around natural law defense of marriage, the archbishop said that he has seen the tension surrounding LGBT issues mount in Latvian society as increased pressure is brought to bear to legalize same-sex unions. 

Invited to a debate on a popular Latvian television show called “One vs. One” after Pope Francis’ remark “who am I to judge?” was widely interpreted in Latvian society as approving homosexual unions, Stankevičs “had the opportunity to explain the teachings of the Catholic Church and what was the real meaning of the Holy Father’s words.” 

After that episode, in dialogue with other Christian leaders, Stankevičs proposed a law aimed at reducing political tensions in the country without jeopardizing the traditional concept of the family. 

The legislation proposed by the ecumenical group of Christians would have created binding regulations aimed at protecting any kind of common household; “for example, two old persons living together to help one another, or one old and one young person who decide to live together.” 

“The law would benefit any household, including homosexual couples, but would not affect the concept of [the] natural family,” Stankevičs explained. “Unfortunately the media manipulated my proposal, and the Agency France Presse presented me internationally as if I was in favor of gay marriage.”  

In 2020, the Constitutional Court in Latvia decided a case in favor of legalizing homosexual couples and ordered the parliament to pass legislation according to this decision.

In response, the Latvian Men’s Association started a campaign to introduce an amendment to the Latvian constitution, to clarify the concept of family. The Latvian constitution in 2005 proclaimed that marriage is only between a man and a woman, but left a legal void regarding the definition of family, which the court wanted to interpret to include homosexual unions. 

The Latvian bishops’ conference supported the amendment presented by the Men’s Association, “but most importantly,” Stankevičs explained, “we put together an ecumenical statement signed by the leaders of 10 different Christian denominations supporting the idea that the family should be based on the marriage between a man and a woman. The president of the Latvian Jewish community, a good friend, also joined the statement.” 

According to Stankevičs, something strange happened next. “The Minister of Justice created a committee to discuss the demand of the constitutional court, and it included several Christian representatives, including three from the Catholic Church, which worked for a year.” But ignoring all the discussions and proposals, the Minister of Justice ended up sending a proposal to parliament that was a full recognition of homosexual couples as marriage.

The response was also ecumenical: Christian leaders sent a letter encouraging the parliament to ignore the government’s proposal. 

According to Stankevičs, the proposal has already passed one round of votes “and it is very likely that it will be approved in a second round of votes, with the support of the New Conservative party. But we Christians continue to work together.”

Preventing gender ideology  

The third field of ecumenical cooperation mentioned by Stankevičs concerned the Istanbul Convention, a European treaty which the Latvian government signed but ultimately did not ratify.

The treaty was introduced as an international legal instrument that recognizes violence against women as a violation of human rights and a form of discrimination against women. 

The convention claims to cover various forms of gender-based violence against women, but Christian communities in Latvia have criticized the heavy use of gender ideology in both the framing and the language of the document. 

The word “gender,” for instance, is defined as “the socially constructed roles, behaviors, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for women and men,” a definition that allows gender to be defined independent of biological sex and therefore opens the document to the question of whether it really is aimed at the protection of women. 

Christian communities also question the biased nature of the committee designated to enforce the convention. 

The governments of Slovakia and Bulgaria refused to ratify the convention, while Poland, Lithuania, and Croatia expressed reservations about the convention though it was ultimately ratified in those countries, a move the government of Poland is attempting to reverse. 

“When we found out that the Latvian parliament was going to ratify it, I went to the parliament and presented the common Christian position,” Stankevičs explained. As a consequence of that visit, the Latvian parliament decided not to ratify the convention, Stankevičs said, crediting the appeal to the unity provided by the common Christian position argued via natural law. 

“In conclusion,” the archbishop said, “I can say that in Latvia we continue to defend the true nature of life and family. But if we Catholics would act alone, we would not have the impact that we have as one Christian majority. That unity is the reason why the government takes us seriously.”

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St Patrick's Catholic Church

The visit of Pope Saint John Paul II to the UK in 1982 was the first visit ever by a reigning Pope to this country. T he visit was by far the most important event for Catholics since their emancipation following over a century of progressive repeal of most of the discriminatory and oppressive legislation in the UK which, for nearly 300 years since the Reformation, had outlawed Catholicism, suppressed the faithful and stripped the Church of her properties and land. During this gradual emancipation the Vatican had restored the Hierarchy to England & Wales and Scotland and returned them to the jurisdiction of 'normal' Church governance in recognition of a more liberal and tolerant society since the end of the 19th Century. The visit was pastoral for the people but was historically significant in so far as there was a symbolic reconciliation between Rome and Church of England and the normalisation of relations with the Church of Scotland.

The Pope arrived in the UK on Friday 28th May, and during his tour visited nine cities, delivering 16 major addresses. Significantly, he met with the Queen and held a joint service alongside the then Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie at Canterbury Cathedral, a once great Catholic shrine. In Scotland the Pope was greeted on the steps outside the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland at The Mound in Edinburgh.

He went on to say five large open air Masses in London, Coventry, Manchester, Glasgow and Cardiff.  Following his six-day visit which took him to locations in England, Scotland and Wales but not Northern Ireland, he returned to the Vatican on 2nd of June.

The Pope's visit to Scotland began on the evening of Monday 31st May 1982 when he landed at Edinburgh airport. He then went onto Murryfield Stadium to meet and speak with 45,000 young people gathered there who had just had Mass said before the Pope arrived. The Pope then met with the Moderator of the Church of Scotland and the leaders of other Protestant churches before finishing the day with a visit to St Mary's Catholic cathedral in Edinburgh. John Paul II then stayed overnight at St Bennet's in Greenhill Gardens, the official residence of the Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh.

The centrepiece of the visit was an open-air Mass in Glasgow the following day, Tuesday 1st  June. The day began in Edinburgh with a visit to patients at St Joseph's Hospital in Rosewell followed by an address to teachers and educationalists at St Andrew's college Bearsden in Glasgow. Afterwards he celebrated Mass at Bellahouston Park for over 300,000 people. 

The weather that day was outstanding and the people of St Patrick's Kilsyth had provided a large contingent of Stewards for crowd control and almost 50 men of Kilsyth's Columban Singers both Catholic and Protestant, took their place amongst the choir. For those not working as a Steward or signing in the choir there were a large number of parishioners who went just simply as pilgrims to Bellahouston to see their Pope and take part in an historic day!

At Bellahouston Park, Glasgow

Papal Visit to Scotland 1982 - John Paul II kisses the ground at Edinburgh Airport with Cardinal Gordon Gray standing beside him.

The Pope in Bellahouston Park

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AROUND THE WORLD; San Marino, at Last,; Gets a Papal Visit

• Aug. 30, 1982

Greeted by a military band and citizens applauding from flower-bedecked balconies on a medieval square, Pope John Paul II today made the first papal visit in the 1,681-year history of San Marino, the world's oldest republic.

John Paul met with the only Communist head of state in Western Europe and said mass for about 10,000 people in the sports stadium in the walled capital of the 23-square-mile nation, perched atop Mount Titano in northern Italy.

The Pope drove into the San Marino square in a navy blue convertible and waved to the crowds, many of whom dropped colorful leaflets saying ''Viva il Papa!'' from their balconies.

After the ornately uniformed band played the national anthem, John Paul went into the castle-like Government palace to a greeting by Giuseppe Maiani, a Communist and one of San Marino's two governing captains regent.

Canterbury Historical and Archaeological Society

Papal Visit (John Paul II)

On 29 May 1982 Pope John Paul II became the first reigning Pope ever to visit UK. The Canterbury city streets were lined with 25,000 well-wishers when he arrived by helicopter and travelled to the cathedral.  After a meeting with Dr Runcie, Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Prince of Wales, held at the deanery, the Pope attended a ceremony with Dr Runcie and Rev Dr Kenneth Greet (Methodist minister), renewing their baptismal vows together. The church leaders then greeted all the cardinals and bishops with a “kiss of peace” before lighting candles for Christian martyrs of different faiths.  Later, the Pope and Archbishop Runcie knelt in silent prayer at the spot where Thomas Becket  was murdered in 1170 (Image 1 – copyright uncertain).

What to see:

• the wall tablet in the Martyrdom  commemorating the Pope’s visit  (Image 2)
• the Papal insignia placed later in the cloisters – the letter M signifies the Virgin Mary (Image 3)

Sources:  see  standard  cathedral sources

A very different papal visit from that of John Paul II in 1982

London letter: the catholic church says that security rules will make it difficult for the faithful to attend, writes mark hennessy….

LONDON LETTER: The Catholic Church says that security rules will make it difficult for the faithful to attend, writes MARK HENNESSY

JUST HOURS away from the beginning of Pope Benedict’s visit to England and Scotland, the Catholic Church is nervous.

His enemies believe his visit should be the stage for mass protests against the Vatican; his supporters hope for a show of support. Mostly, however, the British public is meeting the occasion of Pope Benedict’s visit with indifference.

Despite months of planning for the worst, British police forces now seem confident that the visit will not be targeted by unruly demonstrators, though security will not be relaxed until after his aircraft has taken off for home.

The invitation to make a state visit to the UK was made to Pope Benedict last year by the former prime minister, Presbyterian Gordon Brown, when he was received at the Vatican; though it was always believed that Mr Brown’s predecessor, Tony Blair, who converted to Catholicism after he quit Downing Street, had wanted to host a Papal visit during his time in office.

Much has changed since Pope John Paul II came to the UK on a pastoral visit in 1982 during the Falklands War. He spent six days being greeted like a rock-star as he travelled throughout Britain. In Liverpool, one million lined the seven-mile route from the city’s airport to its Anglican and Catholic cathedrals. Three hundred and fifty thousand came out in Coventry; 200,000 in Manchester; and 190,000 in York.

The 1982 visit faced its own crises. Indeed, it only went ahead after a desperate effort by the Archbishop of Liverpool to persuade the Pope not to cancel everything four days out because of his anger at the British invasion of the Falklands and his refusal to meet with then-British prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, as protocol would have allowed. In the end, the two did not meet.

However, 1982 is not just a foreign land for the Catholic Church, but also for the Church of England and many other Christian religions. The UK has in the three decades since become an increasingly secular society, less inclined to listen to religious figures, and where those who still see themselves as believers increasingly adopt an a la carte attitude to their faith.

An opinion poll published by the Catholic magazine, The Tablet, earlier this month found that just a quarter of those polled from the general population, not just Catholics, actively supported the idea of a state visit for Pope Benedict, while only 24 per cent believed the Catholic Church is a force for good. Only 36 per cent of those polled strongly agreed that religions of any kind are a force for good.

Pope Benedict is not Pope John Paul, who arrived in England as the survivor of an assassination attempt. Neither does he enjoy the communication skills possessed by the Polish pope. He has been damaged in the public eye by his handling of child-abuse cases involving priests – the ultimate responsibility for which lies at the door of his better-loved predecessor.

Nevertheless, Benedict has been pope for five years, and, yet, The Tablet’s opinion poll showed that more people recognised Prince Charles, X Factor entertainment guru Simon Cowell and England soccer manager Fabio Capello than the pope; though he did better than the Church of England Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, who was identified by just 50 per cent of those polled.

In a letter to the Guardian yesterday, opponents of the visit, including actor Stephen Fry, academic Richard Dawkins and writer Terry Prachett, insisted the pope should not be given the honour of a state visit.

They argued that the Vatican is responsible for opposing the distribution of condoms, so increasing large families in poor countries and the spread of Aids, and promoting segregated education. It had sought to deny abortion to “even the most vulnerable women”; opposes equal rights for gay people; and failed to address “the many cases of abuse of children within its own organisation”. “In any case, we reject the masquerading of the Holy See as a state and the pope as a head of state as merely a convenient fiction to amplify the international influence of the Vatican,” said the group.

Questioned about the last-minute preparations on Tuesday, leading British Catholic Chris Patten, who is Prime Minister David Cameron’s liaison for the visit with the church, denied responsibility for the crowds that will greet the pope. Such are matters for the Catholic Church, he was quick to point out.

The crowds will be a fraction of those of 1982. The church has grumbled that security rules have made it tougher than it should be for the faithful to attend.

Patten’s quick footwork in front of the cameras tell much about this visit: in 1982, many wanted to claim credit later; in 2010, it is about wanting to avoid blame.

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Memories of John Paul II’s 1982 papal visit

Decades after the last papal visit Pope Benedict XVI has arrived in Britain. Channel 4 News speaks to Clare Ward who has special memories of John Paul II in 1982 including ham sandwiches and sequins.

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My memories of 1982 of really are just of sheer joy. I was about 9-years old, I went with some members of my family including granny who came along with us.

I remember it took ages to get to Wembley and we seemed to have to walk for miles and miles and miles but the joy when we got there, the atmosphere was just absolutely electric. The stadium was packed with people all excited they all seemed to have ham sandwiches and just having a lovely day out.

Then when the Pope came everyone just went absolutely ballistic in the best possible way, it was just so exciting.

On the day at Wembley, I insisted I went in my Polish national costume because I’m half Polish.

I had the sequined jacket on and the ribbons and the two plats and I was convinced that because the Pope was Polish and I was half Polish as he went round that massive stadium he was going to see me and wave at me personally and I convinced myself he had.

It was just joy, just joy and I felt that connection as someone who shares something of that heritage and I felt so proud and my only memory is of real happiness.

Looking back on it, it’s emotional in the sense that I remember the joy and that feeling of joy; it’s emotional in the sense that granny’s no longer with us so it’s lovely to have that memory of that day.

I do remember the liturgy and the music and the prayer. Obviously as a child I wouldn’t have understood it all but I do remember sitting in the quiet and listening to the silence, as well as all the joy and the singing, and I remember that feeling too.

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The Enduring Legacy of John Paul II’s 1982 Visit to Britain

“For the first time in history,” said Pope St. John Paul II after he stepped off the airplane, “a Bishop of Rome sets foot on English soil.”

In 2022, the Church in Britain marks an important milestone in its long history: This May, it will be 40 years since the first visit of a pope to Britain.

And it almost didn’t happen.

There had been months of preparation, much debate and discussion in the media, elaborate rehearsals by choirs and cathedrals and Catholic organizations, the hiring of massive venues, including London’s famous Wembley Stadium — and then the Falklands war broke out, and the whole idea of a papal visit was called into question.

Most people in Britain knew little or nothing about the Falkland Islands, a small British colony in the South Atlantic. In April 1982, Argentinian forces invaded the Falklands, swept the small British garrison aside, and announced that the islands were now in Argentinian control.  Britain responded by sending a Royal Navy task force, and effectively the British were at war.

As part of the anniversary, I have been dipping into archives and discovering the inside story of the emergency meetings and messages that went back and forth between Britain and Rome as the crisis deepened and the papal visit was at risk of being abandoned. There must have been a great deal of prayer. Pope John Paul II, of course, led the prayers for peace, and British and Argentinian bishops were summoned to Rome, where he celebrated a Mass with them all. And then came the climax of the last-minute rescue operation to save the situation: He flew to Argentina for a swiftly arranged papal visit, before going on to Britain.

It was clear throughout that the Pope was not only neutral but that he was vigorously promoting peace: This was his consistent message, and it never wavered. On this basis, he was able to fly to London’s Gatwick Airport, where, as planned in detail over the previous months, a large crowd, drawn from Catholic parishes across Surrey and Sussex, had gathered to greet him. I was among that crowd. I remember the early-morning start and the excitement as we all arrived in a chartered bus, and then the wait at the airport, where the Duke of Norfolk — by long-established tradition Britain’s senior Catholic layman — greeted the Pope at the airport steps.

This was not, it was emphasized, an official visit. This was a pastoral visit of the Pope to Britain’s Catholics. So no formal representative of the queen was at the airport, and there were no government officials. There was music, and we sang a welcoming hymn. Then there were speeches — and the history was made. The Pope summed it up when he proclaimed , “For the first time in history, a Bishop of Rome sets foot on English soil.”

In its own way, the tragedy of the Falklands War — more than 800 men, British and Argentinian, would eventually lose their lives in the fighting — helped to create a situation where old antagonisms dating back to the Reformation in Britain seemed to dwindle away. The papal visit became a true opportunity for a message of peace and goodwill, with anti-Catholicism of the old sort somehow at variance with a general recognition of the needs of the modern era. The whole visit had, in any case, been planned with ecumenical goodwill in mind, and there were some powerful moments, notably at Canterbury Cathedral , where the Pope prayed with Anglicans at the site of the martyrdom of St. Thomas Becket.

And, yes, he did meet the queen — a courtesy visit, with tea at Buckingham Palace — with evident goodwill on both sides. Queen Elizabeth was wearing, I remember, a blue dress, and they were smiling and chatting as they emerged from the palace after tea. Postcards of the scene quickly became popular — I’ve still got mine.

The papal pilgrimage had the seven sacraments as its theme. At a packed Mass at Westminster Cathedral , the Pope baptized seven candidates of various ages, and then, after crossing the Thames at Lambeth Bridge, he arrived at St. George’s Cathedral, Southwark, which had been cleared of pews and filled with stretchers and wheelchairs bearing sick and disabled people from across Britain, and he administered the sacrament of the sick. And so it went on, across England and Wales and Scotland, with a penitential service, first Holy Communions, confirmations, ordinations and renewal of marriage vows. Vast crowds came, powerful moments of prayer experienced.

It was an unforgettable time. Looking back through the archives, something of the joy and excitement is still evident. So, too, are the changes since those days — the letters are typewritten (remember typewriters?) and there is just one reference to “a computer being installed” as a great innovation at one venue to store relevant information. Color photography relied entirely on film, paper and chemicals (some of the pictures have that curious greenish tinge that I remember well).  Fashions have, of course, changed: Ladies wore dresses, and there were even quite a lot of hats.

What did the papal visit achieve? A great deal. With its massive television coverage, it opened up an authentic vision of Catholic worship: from how Catholics pray to the centrality of the Eucharist. People saw what a baptism is and what is meant by the anointing of the sick. They saw the Pope as a bishop, a man in a white robe preaching about peace and the importance of family life and family prayer. Old notions of the Pope as a sinister foreign figure intent on imposing some sort of political rule were recognized as propaganda from a vanished era.

And that 1982 visit was followed, in the next century, by an official state visit by Pope Benedict XVI, where among much else, he addressed Parliament with a magnificent setting out of the respective roles of Church and state centered on a ringing call for true religious freedom. He led young people in a massive unforgettable night vigil of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in London’s Hyde Park, and he beatified John Henry Newman in a glorious Mass at Cofton Park on the outskirts of Birmingham.

The year 2022 sees another major milestone in Britain’s story: the platinum jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. She has always been clear in her commitment to the Christian faith and spoken of it as central to her life and service.

So much has changed in the 70 years of her reign. While there has been progress in fields that include health and general prosperity, there is also much that is cause for great sadness: Britain is a country with too much violent crime, many unhappy young people, a drug crisis, a worrying suicide rate, and a collapse in a general understanding of many basic moral values, including the value of human life itself.

But the Christian message is still on offer and is the message that holds the hope of renewal; and in a country with a long history, and a tradition of marking anniversaries and jubilees, 2022 brings scope for missionary activity on a new scale. We must pray the opportunity is taken up. A reminder of that historic papal visit four decades ago is part of that. 

• John Paul ii
• united kingdom
• great britain
• papal travels
• queen elizabeth ii

Joanna Bogle Joanna Bogle is the author of some 20 books, including several historical biographies and A Book of Seasons and Celebrations with information on traditions and customs marking the Church year. Her most recent book is John Paul II: Man of Prayer with colleague Clare Anderson, exploring the spiritual life of St. John Paul the Great. She broadcasts regularly with EWTN and initiated popular "Catholic History Walks" around London.

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Homilies 1982

31 december 1982, te deum, [ italian  -  portuguese ], 24 december 1982, midnight mass, 16 december 1982, mass in preparation for christmas for the students of the roman universities, 12 december 1982, pastoral visit to the roman parish of jesus, the good shepherd, 8 december 1982, solemnity of the immaculate conception, [ italian  -  portuguese  -  spanish ], 5 december 1982, pastoral visit to the roman parish of the most holy redeemer, 30 november 1982, mass for a group of priests from apulia (italy), [ italian ], 28 november 1982, mass of the "popular missions" of rome, 24 november 1982, mass for the 2nd anniversary of the visit to cologne, [ german  -  italian ], 22 november 1982, mass for the students of the boarding-school of saint cecilia, 21 november 1982, pastoral visit to palermo, mass at the "favorita" hippodrome, 20 november 1982, mass in the belice valley, 14 november 1982, pastoral visit to the roman parish of saint justin, 9 november 1982, mass in santiago de compostela, 8 november 1982, priestly ordinations, valencia, 8 november 1982, mass for religious women, madrid, 7 november 1982, liturgy of the word at the shrine of montserrat, 7 november 1982, mass in barcelona, liturgy of the word, saragoza (november 6, 1982), 6 november 1982, liturgy of the word and offering of the crosses to the missionaries, javier.

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The Papal Visit

Pope Benedict XVI in the UK

Pope John Paul II greets the staff and the students of Saint Andrew’s College of Education

"To be educated is to be more fitted for life; to have a greater capacity for appreciating what life is, what it has to offer, and what the person has to offer in return to the wider society of man."

My brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,

It is a great joy to me to have this opportunity to greet you here on this beautiful campus of Saint Andrew’s College of Education, at Bearsden, Glasgow. I wish also to express my cordial esteem to the distinguished representatives of the civil and educational authorities of Scotland here present with the staff and students of the college, their parents, clergy and religious, and associates from the schools, universities, colleges of further education, and other institutions of educational science.

Saint Andrew’s College, as I understand, has quite recently been formed from two splendid traditions of teacher-training: Notre Dame College of Education here at Bearsden and Dowanhill, Glasgow, and Craiglockhart College of Education in Edinburgh. As a national college now, it enjoys the same patron as Scotland itself, the Apostle Saint Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, with whom the momentous invitation was received from the Lord almost 2000 years ago: “Come, follow me and I will make you become fishers of men” (Marc. 1, 17).

Today, the Successor of Saint Peter finds himself in the gracious company of the spiritual sons and daughters of Andrew, here in your beautiful Scotland. And although I too am a “man from a far country”, I am not unaware of the rich heritage of Scotland and of this great City of Glasgow and the surrounding region of Strathclyde. Glasgow, the city of Saint Kentigern or Mungo (the good man) whom history regards as its first bishop, dates from as early as the sixth century. A city whose famous mediaeval University has emblazoned on its arms the words of Christ himself – “Via, Veritas, Vita” – of him who is truly “the way, the truth and the life” (Io. 14, 16).

This most pleasant venue causes us to reflect on the importance long given in Scotland to the promotion of sound education, and to consider the implications of this for the present and immediate future.

To mention only a few of the achievements of the past, one thinks of the contribution of Saint Margaret in the eleventh century, that gifted queen and patroness of Scotland; the founding of the Universities of Saint Andrews, Glasgow and Aberdeen (King’s College) in the fifteenth century; the choir of “sang schull” and the grammar schools of the same period; and the subsequent parish schools throughout the land, where the “Dominie” or master gave every encouragement to the “lad o’ pairts”. Not only did Scotland’s sons and daughters eventually bring education to the distant countries of the Commonwealth, but so also have not a few leaders of developing countries been trained in your ancient Universities, including Edinburgh, and your more recent foundations like Strathclyde, Stirling and Glasgow. One notes in particular the longstanding concern of the established Church of Scotland for suitable educational provision at all levels, and we rejoice in its Committees’ increasing collaboration with the Catholic Church, not least in the field of Religious Education.

Worthy of special mention, I feel, are the statutory provisions of the Education (Scotland) Act of 1918, whereby Catholic schools are a constituent part of the State system, with essential guarantees covering Religious Education and the appointment of teachers. In this context, I wish to pay tribute to the Religious and lay-teachers whose dedication paved the way for this system, not forgetting the vision of the civil and ecclesiastical authorities who brought it about, as also their patient discretion in implementing it.

While Catholic teachers and their confreres can take just pride in past achievements, I am sure their realism is no less than that of Thomas Reid and the Scottish “Common Sense” School of philosophy; for common sense alone would exclude any temptation to complacency, not least in view of rapid developments in the social and economic order.

Obviously any sound educational philosophy would have to take all this into account.

It would seem to be the case that in modern times the success of a particular educational programme or system has been measured, to a large extent, by the recognized qualification it provided with a view to some career prospect. This would appear to be felt most in the Secondary sector of education, where direction for future prospects is crucial. Hence the emphasis, until now, on a Certificate-orientated curriculum, with the Certificate seen as the virtual guarantee of career expectations.

Such an outlook has tended to encourage an “outward” trend in education – not itself a bad thing, but a certain balance or perspective has been missing: the perspective of the whole person, his inner self as well as his outer prospects.

But nowadays, as we have been made only too aware, the possession of a certificate does not bring automatic employment. Indeed, this harsh reality has brought about not only deep frustration among young people, many of whom have worked so hard, but also a sense of malaise in the educational system itself. Hence the question: what has gone wrong? What has specialization achieved in our day – in real terms, in terms of life? Wherein lies the remedy?

Perhaps we could reflect on the philosophy behind education: education as the completing of the person. To be educated is to be more fitted for life; to have a greater capacity for appreciating what life is, what it has to offer, and what the person has to offer in return to the wider society of man. Thus, if we would apply our modern educational skills and resources to this philosophy, we might succeed in offering something of lasting value to our pupils and students, an antidote to often immediate prospects of frustration and boredom, not to mention the uncertainty of the long-term future.

I am given to understand that educationists and educational authorities in Scotland have already come to terms with this problem and are giving due emphasis to education as development of the whole person; not only intellectual ability, but also emotional, physical and social development. These integral aspects are, I believe, an ever recurring theme in various official Reports. So what I have to say this morning is by way of moral support and encouragement for the continuing work of implementing these recommendations at every level in the school sector, both Primary and Secondary. I appreciate too that this task of educational development is itself hindered by serious economic factors that impinge very much on staffing provision and material resources. But one cannot but recognize, and welcome, the encouraging factors evidenced by the educational developments themselves.

First and foremost must surely be the increasing involvement of parents, especially in the Primary and Secondary sectors, and also, if to a lesser extent, in the Tertiary sector. In some ways, this has been realized through the structures of Parent/Teacher Associations or similar bodies; the concept of community schools; the opening of school library and leisure facilities to parents; and through this, the wonderful opportunity for Adult or Continuing Education – towards the full development of the person and his or her God-given potential.

It is only right that parents should be more involved in educational structures. For are not parents, in the sight of God, the primary educators of their children? Such a basic principle was underscored by the Second Vatican Council, in particular in the Declaration on Christian Education: “Since it is the parents who have given life to their children, it is they who have the serious obligation of educating their offspring. Hence parents must be recognized as the first and foremost educators of their children” (Gravissimum Educationis, 3).

The promotion of this “integrated, personal and social” education is also, we need hardly mention, the necessary and complementary role of the school. And here, in the day-to-day progress towards objectives, are to be found real elements of encouragement too.

In realizing that consideration for the “whole person” involves his spiritual dimension, one notes that the Scottish education authorities, apart from already approving courses and qualifications for specialist teachers in Religious Education, are giving serious attention to other provisions like national examinations and the services of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate. And it is especially heartening to learn that the Education Committee of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland and the Roman Catholic Education Commission have undertaken a united approach regarding important aspects of this deliberation.

The issues focused on above, especially the development of the whole person, the spiritual dimension of education, and the involvement of parents, have always been central to the ethos of the Catholic school. This has been particularly true of the Primary school, with the close bond between the family, school, parish and local community. Nor has this been absent in the more complex situation of the Secondary sector, where the Diocese often provides Chaplains, above all for the school as a community of faith centred on the Eucharist and also, where possible, to serve as a pastoral link with the local parishes. However, always mindful of the constant need for improvement, the Catholic school ought to make full use of suitable new opportunities available, for no other reason than to fulfil its own identity and role. And we do well at this point to recollect what precisely is the identity and purpose of the Catholic school.

Such a reminder is conveniently provided in the document of that title, “The Catholic School”, published by the Holy See’s Sacred Congregation for Christian Education in March 1977: “The Catholic school”, it declares, “is committed . . . to the development of the whole man, since in Christ, the Perfect Man, all human values find their fulfilment and unity. Herein lies the specifically Catholic character of the school. Its duty to cultivate human values in their own legitimate right in accordance with its particular mission to serve all men has its origin in the figure of Christ . . . Its task is fundamentally a synthesis of culture and faith, and a synthesis of faith and life” (The Catholic School, 35-37).

Implicit throughout these terms of reference for the Catholic school is the imperative of Christian commitment on the part of its teachers. The Catholic school “must be a community whose aim is the transmission of values for living. Its work is seen as promoting a faith-relationship with Christ in whom all values find fulfilment. But faith is principally assimilated through contact with people whose daily life bears witness to it” (Ibid. 53).

In reflecting on the value of Catholic schools and the importance of Catholic teachers and educators, it is necessary to stress the central point of Catholic education itself. Catholic education is above all a question of communicating Christ, of helping to form Christ in the lives of others. Those who have been baptized must be trained to live the newness of Christian life in justice and in the holiness of truth. The cause of Catholic education is the cause of Jesus Christ and of his Gospel at the service of man.

Nor must we ignore the integrity of the catechetical message as taught: “The person who becomes a disciple of Christ has the right to recieve ‘the word of faith’ (Rom. 10, 8) not in mutilated, falsified or diminished form but whole and entire . . . Thus no true catechist can lawfully, on his own initiative, make a selection of what he considers important in the deposit of faith as opposed to what he considers unimportant, so as to teach the one and reject the other . . . The method and language used must truly be means for communicating the whole and not just part of ‘the words of eternal life’ (Io. 6, 68; cfr. Act. 5, 20; 7, 38) and the ‘ways of life (Ps. 16, 11, cit. in Act. 2, 28)’ (IOANNIS PAULI PP. II Catechesi Tradendae, 30-31)”.

Whereas most of my address has centred on the crucial area of the school, with obvious implications for teacher-training, I would hope that those here present from the Universities would recognize, with this former university professor, the relevance of the school for the university: not merely as a recruiting-ground for students, but as an essential part of the continuing process of education.

As for the university itself, I would simply like to mention some points I have had occasion to make on this topic, to the General Conference of UNESCO, to various university groups in Rome, and in Bologna only last April. I feel that the last mentioned is particularly appropriate, since I am told that it was the University of Bologna which provided the ancient Scottish universities with significant elements of their splendid tradition.

From its very origins and by reason of its institution, the purpose of the university is the acquiring of a scientific knowledge of the truth, of the whole truth. Thus it constitutes one of the fundamental means which man has devised to meet his need for knowledge. But, as the Second Vatican Council observed, “Today it is more difficult than it once was to synthesize the various disciplines of knowledge and the arts. While, indeed, the volume and the diversity of the elements which make up culture increase, at the same time the capacity of individual men to perceive them and to blend them organically decreases, so that the image of universal man becomes even more faint” (Gaudium et Spes, 61). Any interpretation of knowledge and culture, therefore, which ignores or even belittles the spiritual element of man, his aspirations to the fullness of being, his thirst for truth and the absolute, the questions that he asks himself before the enigmas of sorrow and death, cannot be said to satisfy his deepest and most authentic needs. And since it is the university that young people experience the high point of their formation education, they should be able to find answers not only about the legitimacy and finality of science but also about higher moral and spiritual values – answers that will restore their confidence in the potential of knowledge gained and the exercise of reason, for their own good and for that of society.

By way of summing-up, I would like to repeat what I wrote last November in the Apostolic Exhortation on the Family in the Modern World: “It becomes necessary, therefore, on the part of all, to recover an awareness of the primacy of moral values, which are the values of the human person as such. The great task that has to be faced today for the renewal of society is that of recapturing the ultimate meaning of life and its fundamental values” (IOANNIS PAULI PP. II Familiaris Consortio, 8).

And as Christians we believe that the ultimate meaning of life and its fundamental values are indeed revealed in Jesus Christ. It is he – Jesus Christ, true God and true man – who says to us: “You call me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for so I am” (Io. 13, 13-14).

Gifts offered to Pope John Paul II at Bellahouston Park

Traditional Scottish gifts are offered to Pope John Paul II in Glasgow – from the Scotland national football strip to some whiskey!

Pope John Paul II’s homily at Bellahouston Park

Listen to Pope John Paul II’s full homily at Bellahouston Park in Glasgow

Pope John Paul II is welcomed to Glasgow, Scotland.

Pope John Paul II receives a warm welcome to Bellahouston Park, Glasgow in 1982

Pope John Paul II addresses the priests and religious men and women of Scotland

Pope John Paul II spoke to 1,000 nuns, monks and priests at St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh.

Pope John Paul II meets with leaders of Christian Churches

Pope John Paul II meets with Scottish Church leaders.

Pope John Paul II to the Catholic Bishops of Scotland

Pope John Paul II met the Bishops of Scotland in Edinburgh in 1982.

Holy Mass in Bellahouston Park

Pope John Paul II celebrates Mass for 300,000 worshippers at Bellahouston Park, Glasgow.

Pope John Paul II speaks to Scotland’s young people

Pope John Paul II addressed 44,000 young Scots at Murrayfield Stadium.

Pope John Paul II visits Saint Joseph’s Hospital

Pope John Paul II praised staff at St Joseph’s Hospital, Rosewell, Edinburgh.

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